What A Name Part 1

Pastor Mike will be speaking on What A Name Part 1. He will be reading out of Isaiah 9:1-7.

Jesus Christ went to that cross. He bore the punishment for our sin. But when we respond to God and we repent of our sins and we receive Jesus Christ as our Savior, then we are no longer slaves to sin, but we are slaves to righteousness and we are servants of God.

Hello, this is Pastor Mike Sanders from The Open Door Church, and I want to welcome you to Hope Worth Having radio broadcast. And today we’re going to be in the book of Isaiah chapter nine. We have been studying the book of Isaiah and as we are tracking through it, we’re going chapter by chapter, verse by verse.

And today we’re going to be speaking on what a name we think about the name of Jesus. What a name. Let’s study together.

There is this progression of the portrait of a fearful king to a portrait of a royal king, a son, a child who exercises his dominion to bring salvation to the world. It is climaxed in verse six through seven of chapter nine. Now, remember when we began the study of Isaiah, I told you that whenever we read the book and the chapters and the verses, we have to ask ourselves the question, are we in the past? Are we in the present? Are we in the future? In chapter six, we’re in the past.

Isaiah takes us back to that calling upon his life, that moment when King Uzziah had died. And Isaiah and King Uzziah were very dear friends, and he was so devastated, and he was so overwhelmed with grief and sorrow in his heart that he ends up in the temple at the altar before the throne of God. And he is prostrate before God, crying out to God.

And the Bible teaches us that Isaiah had this great revelation, this great vision of the throne of God, in which the seraphims are circling the throne of God, crying out, holy, holy, holy is the Lord our God. Isaiah takes us back to that call. We jump into chapter seven, and Isaiah takes us to the present.

He takes us to the present of the dilemma of King Ahaz and the people of God, and will they trust God? Will they believe in God? Will they turn to God? We see this unfolding in chapter seven and chapter eight. It’s about the present. But when we get to chapter nine, church, listen, we’re talking about the future.

It’s important for you to know that so that you can not only understand the context, but that you can properly apply what God is saying to our hearts this morning. So we come to chapter nine, and we’re looking into the future. But before we dive into chapter nine, we cannot forget how chapter eight ended.

Look at verse 22 of chapter eight. In verse 22, he says, Then they will look to the earth and see trouble and darkness, gloom of anguish, and they will be driven into darkness. Why are they driven into darkness? Because of the decision of a king, because of the decision to rely upon the Assyrian government for their provisions and their needs.

And now the people are driven into darkness. Like the prophet Jeremiah, and like Daniel in the book of Daniel, Isaiah the prophet does not leave the people hopeless in their darkness. He immediately, in the midst of this darkness, is ushering them in to the future of what is to come.

When we walk through grief, and when we walk through sorrow, and when we walk through darkness, it is the hope of God’s promises. It is the hope of the future that helps us to be able to endure and be sustained through the challenges and the problems of this world. And that’s why God keeps sending his prophet to say, I know you’re in darkness.

I know that there’s gloom. I know that it’s difficult and there are problems, but God has a plan in the midst of your darkness. Example, we love to quote Jeremiah 29 verse 10.

And we say, God has a plan for me. He has a hope for me. The prophet Jeremiah said, it’s not a hope of darkness, but it’s a hope of joy and peace.

Now listen, when Jeremiah gave that prophecy, it was given to the people who were in the midst at the very onset of a 70 year captivity by the Babylonian empire. Jeremiah was reminding the people, as you go through this 70 years, God has a plan. God has a purpose.

As you walk through these difficult times, as you go through this 70 year judgment, God is still working and there is still hope, and there is still light, and there is still a promise that God is giving you. Why? Because it is that prophecy of hope that sustains the people of God as they walk through the valleys of life. And so it is today that there are many times that all we have is a promise from God.

Amen? That as we walk through those grief stricken seasons of our life, as we deal with the challenges and the problems and the difficulties of life, that it is a promise of God that helps us and sustains us and helps us to endure for the cause of Jesus Christ. That’s what you’re seeing unfold from chapter 8 to chapter 9. So as we are reminded in Ephesians 2, 12, that even the apostle Paul said that at that time, in Ephesians chapter 2, verse 12, he reminded them, you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenant of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. People that do not know Jesus Christ have no hope.

They’re without God. There’s nothing to look forward to. I know politicians are promising the golden age, but the true golden age isn’t coming until Jesus Christ returns.

Our hope church cannot be in a political figure or a political party. It must be in the Lord Jesus Christ alone. Please remember that the golden age is found in Christ.

So let’s read some hope in verse 1 and 2 of chapter 9. Nevertheless, the gloom will not be upon her who is distress, as when at first he lightly esteemed the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward more heavily oppressed her by the way of the sea beyond the Jordan in Galilee of the Gentiles. Look at verse 2. The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Those who dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them a light has shined.

Remember verse 22 of chapter 8. They’re in darkness. They’re in anguish. They’ve been driven into the darkness, not of their own choices, but the choices of a political figure named Ahaz, who chose to rely upon the Assyrian government.

But in verse 1 and 2 of chapter 9, he says to them that the people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Suddenly, the prophet Isaiah is taking us to the future and he is reminding us that God is going to say to his people, let there be light, and there will be light. Just like in Genesis chapter 1, when the Bible teaches us about the creation of God, that God said, let there be light, and in the midst of a world that there was no form, and there was no light, and it was just darkness everywhere, that God brought light through his creative power.

But God is bringing light to those who are in spiritual darkness, to those who are struggling with what the future will be, and this light is nothing less than the light of the glory of God found in Jesus Christ. The apostle again in 2 Corinthians 4 verse 6 says, for it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who is shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. What is he talking about? He’s talking about the first coming of Jesus Christ.

Stay with me. Don’t be bored by all this background and context information. Don’t be overwhelmed with it because it sets the table for what God is trying to say to us this morning.

What the prophet Isaiah is reminding the people that right now you’re under attack, you’re under siege by the Assyrian government, and you’re in darkness, you’re being driven to darkness, but one day light is coming. One day the people who walked in darkness will see a great light. Church, we know because we can look backwards, we know that that light is Jesus Christ.

Jesus came in the power of perfect teaching and of signs and wonders beginning in the dark region of Galilee. If I was a person who liked to underscore my Bible, I would go to verse 1 and I would underscore that phrase in Galilee of the Gentiles. I would then back up and go to the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali because that would tell me details that will help me to know that what God is saying is not some kind of a power of positive thinking attitude that he wants me to have in the midst of the darkness, but he’s giving me prophetic details that are going to unfold in the life of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Zebulun, Naphtali, they are the cities on the northern border of Galilee. When you think of the Roman Empire and you think of the Middle East and you think of the times in which Jesus Christ walked upon this earth, Galilee would be like a state or a province, if you will. And within that province, there would be cities, there would be towns.

And so he is reminding us that Zebulun and Naphtali are on the northern border of Galilee. And he is saying to us, this is where the light is going to begin. You say, why is that important, Mike? Well, I’ll tell you, that’s where the invasion of the Assyrian king began his march into Israel and the dark days of Israel, of God’s people, started.

At the point of darkness, God brings the light. At your point of darkness, God brings the light of Jesus Christ. Our light is not the world.

Our light is not politics. Our light is not our circumstances. Our light is a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Symbolically, figuratively, Jesus marches in to Galilee and he ushers in the beginning of his public ministry, not just anywhere, not just randomly, not just, hey, this looks like a good place to plant our headquarters and let’s begin this great ministry that God has sent me here for. Strategically, Jesus is fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah in verse 1 and 2. If you had a hard time believing chapter 7, verse 14, that God would send his son through a virgin birth, again, God reveals himself in the ministry of Christ and how it begins. This place where the Assyrian soldiers would first enter into the promised land of God’s people, this place is where Jesus began his public ministry.

Hang in there with me. Jesus said in John 8, verse 12, I am the light of the world and he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness but shall have the light of life. Jesus first revealed himself.

If you recall in your study of the Gospels, particularly the Gospel of Matthew chapter 4, that Jesus revealed himself in the synagogue of Galilee. It was there that he got up and he quoted the prophet Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 60 and he reminded the people that he was the light shining in the darkness, that he was the one who was healing the blind. He was the one releasing the prisoners from darkness and he fulfilled this messianic prophecy.

It so infuriated the religious crowd that Jesus Christ himself would declare himself to be the fulfillment, the Messiah who would come and bring sight to the blind. It wasn’t just that he fulfilled Isaiah chapter 60 in that as he ministered he did exactly that and we’ll show you a little bit later here how he did it in a tremendous way in Galilee, but he was at the Syrian attack began, that when the darkness began Jesus showed himself to be the light. Remember church that the first miracle that Jesus performed was changing water into wine? Where was that? It was in Cana of Galilee.

Jesus then poured out rivers of miracles in Matthew chapter 4 verse 23 through 25. Where was he when he was healing the blind, raising the lame? Where was Jesus? He was in none other than Galilee and he was beginning his ministry of unquenchable light to the people of God. Isaiah the prophet continues to bring hope to the people and not only connecting the dots of what is to come and you and I have the blessing of being able to look back and see that Jesus Christ did fulfill Isaiah chapter 7. He did fulfill Isaiah chapter 9. We come down to verse 3. It says you have multiplied the nation and increased its joy.

That is God has multiplied the nation. They rejoice before you according to the joy of harvest as men rejoice when they divide the spoil for you have broken the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder the rod of his oppressor as in the day of Midian for every warrior’s sandal from the noisy battle and the garments rolled in blood will be used for burning and fuel of fire. A stunning victory.

The prophet Isaiah prophesies of a stunning victory that has two tiers, if you will. First of all, the stunning victory of Jesus Christ on the cross. The stunning victory of Jesus Christ dying for our sins.

We read these verses and we can see truly these things are true in our life. It is what God has brought to us. A stunning victory over sin.

The people rejoice in seeing this light. When you truly come to Jesus Christ, it’s not oh hum. It’s not well, I’m glad I did that.

There is an infusion of joy and peace in your heart. There is so much rejoicing in your life that you can’t believe that God would save a sinner like you and like me. It’s amazing.

We burst out in songs and the Bible says that we’re a new creation and we’re singing new songs. Not just songs that have been recently written and have bursted from our hearts, but new songs, songs of the saints, songs of God’s people rejoicing in the salvation that is found in Jesus Christ. What does he do? He tells us about the victory of a great war.

It expands the nation. Remember that Jesus Christ told his disciples that they were to take this gospel and they were to expand it to the nations. They were to take this gospel and spread it to all the people groups, go into the world and to share this gospel to all the nations, to every language, to every ethnicity, to every person on this planet.

We see the expansion of the kingdom of God. What does it bring? It brings abundance to all. Remember that Jesus told us in John chapter 10 that I’ve come that you might have life and that you might have it more abundantly.

He came that we might have spiritual life and that we might have it abundantly, that it would be like rivers of joy flowing out of our very bellies, that we would rejoice and be so overwhelmed and touched by the grace and the hand of God that he would save our soul and that he would bring us into the kingdom of light out of the kingdom of darkness. It’s a stunning victory in our hearts. As if that wasn’t enough, the prophet reminds us as we look at these verses, he reminds us in verse 4, for you have broken the yoke of his burden and the staff of his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, as in the day of Midian.

Now, you can’t understand that unless you’re studying your Bible. That’s why I tell you to read your Bible. That’s why Pastor Mike trains you on how to study your Bible.

You’re gonna get more joy and more resources and more strength from the word of God than anything in your life. And he says again, as in the day of Midian. Oh, I remember Midian.

I remember Gideon. I remember Judges chapter 6 and 7. And I remember that Gideon, he didn’t think that he could do anything for God. And he kind of had a complex of self pity.

And he said, Lord, I’m not the guy. You got the wrong person. And God said, you’re it.

You’re the one that’s going to lead the army to overthrow the Midianites. And Gideon’s like, no, wrong guy, wrong person. Have you ever been there? Have you ever thought you weren’t the right person? And you declined the opportunity that God put before you because you said, God, I’m not that man.

I’m not that person. I’m not that person that has this calling. I just want to be in the background, God.

That was Gideon. And he had a lot of good excuses. If you need a plethora of excuses, go to Judges chapter 6 and 7, because there’s plenty of them.

As if God wasn’t already making it difficult, choosing the least among God’s people, Gideon, who had insecurity problems, who enjoyed self pity, chose him to lead the people of God to overthrow the Midianites, as if that wasn’t enough, God told Gideon to downsize his army. Do you remember how many? Anybody? 300. Thank you.

Downsize your army to 300. To 300? Are you sure, God? But here’s what God was doing when Israel was powerless, when they were enslaved by the Midianites. He was manifesting his glory.

And he, again, was ripping through the darkness of the slavery of the Midianites, bringing the light of Yahweh, the light of Jesus Christ, and the evil forces of Midian were turned on themselves, and they imploded. They began to destroy one another, and as a result, the oppressive yoke and the rod on their shoulders and the staff of their oppressors was shattered, as Isaiah said, and all the trampling boots and sandals became bloodied garments that were destined for the fire. Look at verse 5. For every warrior’s sandal, some translations put boots, from the noisy battle, and garments rolled in blood will be used for the burning and fuel of fire.

Do you remember? As in the day of Midian, this great victory is going to take place in the same way the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ has defeated Satan’s seemingly unbreakable yoke upon the hearts of people, that Jesus Christ went to that cross, and he bore the punishment for our sin, and now, we were no longer slaves to sin, but when we respond to God, and we repent of our sins, and we receive Jesus Christ as our Savior, then we are no longer slaves to sin, but we are slaves to righteousness, and we are servants of God. The oppressor’s yoke has been released upon us. Satan thought by the death of Jesus, he would have victory, but God flipped everything on its head, and created a stunning spiritual victory for all those who would believe in Jesus Christ, and Jesus died on the cross to take care of our past, and he rose again out of the grave to take care of our future, so that we could be eternally with the Lord Jesus Christ.

Can God’s people say amen? Oh, it’s wonderful. It’s no wonder that the Bible says, for as much then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death. That is the devil, for we not only see the salvation that the yoke and bondage of sin has been released, but now the sting of death is gone.

Why? Because we know for us as believers that death is just a transition. It’s a graduation. It’s a promotion for us into our eternal life with the Lord Jesus Christ.

That’s the stunning victory, and as if that wasn’t enough, and as if you aren’t already inundated with everything that Pastor Mike has already been teaching you, I want to remind you that Isaiah is not only talking about that stunning victory in which Jesus Christ, the Messiah, who would be born of a virgin, and that he would begin his ministry in the northern parts of Galilee, but he’s reminding us about another stunning victory of the second coming of Jesus Christ. That stunning victory in which the martyrs of the tribulation period who came to believe in Christ, those martyrs who put their faith and trust in Jesus Christ around the throne of God in the book of Revelation chapter 6, and they are crying out to God Almighty, how long will it be before you avenge our blood? How long will it be, O God, before you bring justice to the world? How long will it be, O God, before you right every wrong in this world? And we read the book of Revelation, and we get to chapter 19, and we see that at the end of the tribulation period, Jesus Christ, in a stunning victory, will split the eastern skies. He will step out on the Mount of Olives, and he will destroy all the kingdoms of mankind.

He will destroy all the kingdoms of this world, and he, my friend, will establish his kingdom on this earth, and he will rule and reign as the righteous king. He will bring peace and justice that we have longed for, whether we are here now, or we are there then, or we are in our eternal state with Jesus Christ. My friend, we will finally see true justice and peace in the world through Jesus Christ.

You say, Pastor, why are you stuck on this eschatology, the study of end times, in which Jesus Christ will physically rule and reign? Not all of our friends who love Jesus Christ agree with Pastor Mike, but I want you to note something. The Bible tells us down in verse 6 that after it gives us, unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder. His name will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and peace, there will be no end. Upon the throne of David and over his kingdom. Stop.

You see, that’s not just a spiritual kingdom. That is a physical kingdom. That is a legitimate kingdom that we’ve already read about in the Old Testament, and so we believe with all of our hearts that Jesus will sit upon the throne of David, and he will oversee his kingdom, and to order it and establish it with judgment and justice from that time forward, even forever.

And as if that wasn’t enough for me to believe, the Bible reminds me that the zeal and the passion of the Lord of hosts will perform it, or they will accomplish this. They will make it happen. Now, I’m old school.

I know some of you are fancy, but if the Bible says it, I believe it. And that’s why I believe in the second coming of Jesus Christ. And you and I can debate on timing and the nature of it, and we can discuss the details of it and have a great time, but you’re never going to take away the hope of the second coming from Pastor Mike.

Because, you see, when the Bible talks about the rapture, or it talks about the second coming, it’s never designed to be impressive of your biblical knowledge. It’s never designed to be something so that you can articulate in such a profound way. People can say, wow, what a student of the Bible.

But the apostles give us this prophecy for hope during darkness, during grief, during sorrow. And perhaps you may recall that I said the prophets, Jeremiah, Daniel, and Isaiah, and on down the list, always gave prophecy of the future to the people of God in the midst of their sorrow, and their darkness, and their sadness to bring hope, and light, and peace to the heart. And so when you begin to understand these big themes in the Bible, you begin to see that these details always align together with the hope that is found in the light of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I want to encourage you this morning to put your hope in Jesus, because He is the answer, and He is the light for our darkness. I hope you’re enjoying and learning and growing as we look at Jesus and what a name He had. I want to encourage you to check out our website, HopeWorthHaving.com. HopeWorthHaving.com. Go to the website.

You can see many wonderful things there. This is Pastor Mike Sanders reminding you that in Christ, there is hope worth having.